Chapter 27

Plans pounded through Yren’s head but he couldn’t see how any of them could work and keep his family safe. His own safety never even entered his mind, only the safety of his loved ones. He watched, his mind churning, as one of the Reds pulled the covering from his mouth and smirked, bending down to grab the two black swords at Yren’s feet.

The metal whispered a warning to Yren, an image of caution and regret. Yren opened his mouth but shut it again quickly, his eyes closing. There was a flash of light, bright against the lids of his eyes. He felt the surge of energy even before he felt it across his face, the sizzling sound of burning meat crashing through his ears. He heard a scream and the smell of burning flesh reached his nose before he opened his eyes.

The Red was no longer smirking. Instead, his eyes and mouth were wide in horror, and he was screaming in pain. His robed arms ended in blistering, bloody balls of burnt flesh, his fingers fused to his hands in rounded stumps of charred meat. The Reds around him were staring in horror at what remained of the man’s hands.

Yren didn’t wait for the Reds to recover from their horror. His anger rising within him, he reached his arms back, encircling the waist of the two holding his upper arms. With a loud roar of his own, he jerked his arms forward, lifting the two and throwing them at the surrounding Reds.

As the Reds in front of him fell, toppled by the two he’d thrown, the man with the burnt stumps for hands was still screaming. Yren dove down, his armor clattering loudly in his ears. He grabbed ‘Hatred’ and ‘Rage’ and rolled over. He knew he’d never get to his feet so he didn’t even try, bringing his two swords to the ready from his back.

In a moment, his eyes took in everything around him. The shock of the Red Guard’s burnt hands hadn’t shocked his comrades enough, the remaining Reds were moving. He saw the two knights, Uud and Syl, swords almost magically out of their scabbards, their faces grim as they faced off with the Reds surrounding them. Elva, using her chain mail wrapped arms to push Bena and Issa back as the Reds in front of her moved forward, swords readying to thrust. Caprice and Mulet stepping backward, tears in their eyes, screams contorting their faces as they tried to push their backs through the very walls as the Red Guard advanced on them.

And then his eyes fell on Ardt, one arm still held, the other free. His face was a mask of surprise and pain, anger and fear. His brows were arched, his eyes opened wide. His mouth gaped in a silent gasp, a faint trickle of blood at the corners.

A sword thrust through his upper chest.

At first, Yren couldn’t believe it and his mind couldn’t make sense of it. Ardt was wearing mail armor. Surely a sword couldn’t get through mail armor? Details prickled through his mind; the raising of the hem of the mail coif now draped across the top of the sword, the sword plunged through the gap in the v-shaped neck of the mail shirt.

Lying there, watching Ardt’s face grow white, the man’s hands raising up to futilely clutch at the sword being pulled from his chest, Yren’s entire world narrowed. His heart pounded, his head seemed to burst and his vision blurred as tears streamed from his eyes. There didn’t seem to be enough oxygen in the room anymore; he couldn’t draw breath into his lungs.

“Ardt?” His voice was a mere whisper, unheard and nearly silent. “Oh gods, no. No.” His voice grew stronger as his vision cleared. His body felt like it was on fire as the beat of his broken heart pounded within his chest. The anger burning through him turned in on itself and succumbed to the white-hot magma which was Yren’s burning rage. The conflagration spread to his arms and legs, to his face and fingers.

“FATHER!” The cry was loud, louder than the sounds of the violence around him. So loud that everyone seemed to pause, to glance at the young man in blue armor. Yren couldn’t remember standing, couldn’t figure out how he was suddenly upright. He couldn’t feel the weight of the armor, anymore; he couldn’t feel anything outside of the painful, bloated feeling encompassing his body. The pain and agony of loss, and a frenzied fury.

The word released something inside of him and the horrible, terrible rage within him doubled and doubled again, rising from the endless beating of a heart grown hot as a sun. Behind the great helm he still wore, his face turned tight, lips spread in a snarl across teeth clenched near to breaking. The fire of his rage scorched through him until it could not be contained.

A blue flame burst from his eyes, licking tongues of blue fire coruscating from the edges, the light blazing from the hollowed eye-sockets of the helm.

It was not enough, not enough for the rage and pain burning through him, for the hatred that consumed him. He lifted his black swords in his hands, his grip holding them at the ready. His entire body felt like it burst as blue flame erupted from him. It traced the twin sigils on his chest in an instant and the markings of Deia and Kyr were suddenly outlined in brightest blue. The flame spread from the sigils, ripples of burning blue flames flowing out in bubbling circles that swept in mere instants over the entire surface of his armor.

When the flames reached the swords in his hands, they turned. The swords darkened even further, going from night to the unimaginable black of complete lightlessness. It was as if the swords started to draw the very light around them into their unquenchable depths releasing, in turn, a haunting black fire flickering at their edges. Even the mirrored silver of the hilts turned black, with only the pommel at the back of Yren’s hands emitting a glowing light of a deepest red, a burning ember in the darkness.

Then, seemingly above the swords themselves, a blue light etched its way along an intricate, unchanging path. Engraved in blue light above each chasm which was the blade were the names of the swords – ‘Hatred’ on the left, ‘Rage’ on the right.

Yren took one step forward, one unimaginable step as the fire burned within him ... and stopped. Everything stopped. Nothing around him moved – and he found he couldn’t move either. There was no sound, no motion. The pain and rage within him paused – not stopped, not ended. It was there, just out of his reach.

Into his vision, his youngest sister walked confidently, her eyes questioning. Yren started as he noticed they weren’t her eyes, however. Still the same bluish gray, her eyes glowed in a way they never had before. As he watched, entranced, he realized the glow wasn’t just in her eyes; there was a glow all around her.

She stopped before him, looking him up and down curiously. “This look becomes you, I think,” Bena said softly – only it was and yet wasn’t Bena’s voice. The sound was the same but there was an echo within it, a chorus of a thousand voices all speaking in his adopted sister’s tones. It was on the edge of musical, as if the words were sung instead of spoken but sung from an unimaginable place an unimaginable distance away. “Though the necessity of it does not.”

She slowly looked up into his eyes. “You have faced unimaginable loss this day.” She looked over at the unmoving smith, the sword still partially embedded in his chest. “A father.” She looked back to Yren. “And a sister and lover; Teran. My vessel echoes your loss and, through her, I feel aggrieved as well.” She paused, looking over Yren’s face, as if she could see him through the metal. Finally, she nodded. “And what would you give, if it were within your power to return the dead to life?”

“Anything,” Yren said at once. It was said without thought, his lips and tongue moving though the rest of his body was unable.

“Anything?” Bena smiled sadly. “You don’t know the meaning of the word. Anything is – more than you can possibly know right now.” Bena-who-was-not-Bena sighed. “Would you give your life?”

“Yes,” Yren said without thought. He would gladly give his life for his father and sister. He didn’t even have to think about it.

Bena-who-was-not’s smile brightened. “You reply without thought; without hesitation. No wonder my sister is so fond of you.” She pursed her lips, her head tilting to one side. “These mortals have a tradition; something for something, nothing for nothing. A trade. I will trade your life to bring life...”

“Agreed,” Yren interrupted. He didn’t need to hear the rest; his life for theirs was something he could easily agree to.

“Allow me to finish,” she intoned sadly. “Though hardly equal, it has to be one life for one life. Your life for one of theirs. Which do you choose?”

Yren’s eyes widened. “You can’t ask that of me,” he gasped. “I cannot choose one over the other.”

“Yet, that is the bargain,” Bena-who-was-not replied. “One life for one life. I knew it would be a difficult choice, which is one of the reasons I pushed your rage beyond your ability to touch it – pushed all of your emotions just out of your reach. They will not crowd your thinking. So, choose.”

Yren drew a breath, his mind deep in thought. Ardt or Teran, Teran or Ardt. The man who’d been his father when he needed one or the young woman he loved. There was no right choice, no logical choice. There was no way he could choose between the two.

Bena felt her mother’s arm pushing her back, behind her. She bumped into Issa, being pushed from the opposite side. Her mother moved back a step, her arms wide, keeping her children behind her until their backs hit the wall and there was nowhere left to go. She was screaming, trying to find a way – any way – out.

She felt her mother tense, felt her mother’s arms moving back to protect her. She could see the Reds in front of her mother, advancing. She felt so helpless, so powerless. She was still just a Novice, uninitiated to the full measure of ‘Tyln’s Grace’ – the ability to use Tyln’s power to defend herself or those around her. All she could do was some minor healing; nothing she could use just now. She lacked the faith in Tyln to be able to do more; all of her faith was in Deia – but she was not a Novitiate of Deia’s. She looked around for anything she could grab, anything to help her defend her family.

As she was casting about for anything she could use, she felt – a hiccup. As if the world around her had changed in some infinitesimal way. A shudder, a jostling of reality. It was something very simple, yet very profound, but it was something she just couldn’t wrap her head around.

Then, a single word pierced the air around her. A word of unfathomable anguish and pain screamed large. A sound louder than any she had ever heard. “FATHER!”

It was Yren’s voice, but harsh and guttural, a wail which somehow carried with it a sense of power and even – destiny. She moved to her left, trying to see what had happened to her adopted brother – but as soon as he came into her sight, his blue armor viewed between the bodies of the Red Guard, she stopped – and couldn’t move.

Everything stopped. The Reds stopped advancing, her mother didn’t move, her sister – nothing moved. She couldn’t move.

She watched as her brother turned, his armor suddenly making no sound. He turned and looked at her, his hands reaching up and removing his helm. She watched curiously as he walked to her, stepping between the Reds without seeming to touch them. He moved to the space in front of her, somehow managing to step between the Reds and her mother and yet still being far enough away to look at her.

“Bena,” Yren said softly, but there was something wrong with his voice. The voice was softer, more lilting, a feminization of her brother’s normal deep timbre. There was an echo within the word, too; a sound beyond sound echoing in the word itself.

There was something wrong with his eyes, the blue was brighter than she could remember. The lightest blue of the sky, glowing with the warmth of the sun. As he continued, she understood suddenly; this was not her brother. “The unbreakable.”

Yren-who-was-not-Yren reached out, lifting the necklace her brother had given her. He examined it carefully, smiling softly before allowing it to fall back to her chest, his gaze returning to her. “Forced to worship my brother but never bending her knee to him. You’ve called to me in prayer, never losing faith I would one day answer even though I remained silent.”